page_title: Hospice général
section_title: Funding
hierarchical_section_title: Hospice général / History: from the Hôpital général to the Hospice général / Funding
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Billet de loterie du XVIIIe siècle
context_page_description: The Hospice général is the main public assistance office of the Republic and Canton of Geneva. The institution's main missions are: Social support and financial assistance for individuals and families who are without sufficient resources; Welcome and assistance, including financial help, for asylum seekers, along with providing living accommodations; Assistance and housing for troubled young adults; Management of a leisure center and two holiday homes for the elderly; Prevention of and information about social ills for all categories of the population.
  The institution has existed since 1535, when it was founded as a charitable institution to provide assistance to the poor.
context_section_description: From the outset the Hôpital général enjoyed a variety of financial sources. Funds came first of all from the ancient possessions of a number of small medieval hospitals and the ecclesiastical tithes levied on surrounding lands. Later the institution was left numerous properties both inside and outside the city walls to ensure its autonomy and ability to carry out its mission. The Hôpital général quickly became a large property owner in fact, even possessing lands for farming and wine growing in several areas (Plainpalais, La Cluse, Malagnou and Bossey, at the foot of Mount Salève) that went to furnish the Hôpital's own tables in Bourg-de-Four. Hectares of forested land also guaranteed a steady supply of wood for heating.
  The Hôpital général was also granted the revenues from residency and bourgeoisie (full citizenship) fees paid by beneficiaries of those rights, as well as the taxes levied on entertainments, mainly street shows (the so-called paupers’ tax).
  Donations, bequests and monies from collection boxes represented a good third of the institution's revenues.
  The monopoly that the Hôpital général held over the rental of “mourning coats” and other funeral objects generated significant revenues and constituted an additional privilege granted to the institution. Perhaps more surprising are the lotteries that were organized in the eighteenth century through a company founded for the occasion; the lotteries took place several times a year. Far from being a paltry source of funds, they sold upwards of 15,000 tickets for a sum total of three hundred thousand Genevan pounds.
  All kinds of financial investments were also largely used during the period from the Reformation to the late nineteenth century. Often these involved life annuities contracted with wealthy widows. According to the records, however, these investments often turned out to be unprofitable. And although the Hôpital général was already a landholder with numerous properties to its name, the government granted it the rights to the pasture fees for the vast glacis surrounding the city. Thus, the Hôpital général leased the glacis of Rive and Neuve, for instance, to a butcher to graze his sheep there. The same type of arrangement held for the fortifications of Saint-Gervais and their glacis.
caption: An eighteenth-century lottery ticket
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